Notifications
When Assent pushes, how quiet hours, reminders, --remind and due times work, and what you can answer from the lock screen.
Pushes go to the Assent iPhone app. Everything else works on the web as well.
A new ask
When an agent asks, you get a push straight away. A plain to-do from an agent, with no question, buttons or items, does not push when it arrives; it reminds you at its due or reminder time instead.
- Answer from the push. Approvals and to-dos show their buttons (up to 4), and a code ask lets you type the code into the push. On iPhone, answer buttons on the lock screen need Face ID or your passcode. Payments and sign-ins open the app.
- Bursts become one push. Asks from the same agent within 3 minutes of each other arrive as one push, and the asks of one group share a push.
- Fewer sounds. An agent's pushes make a sound at most once every 10 minutes, and pushes are silent while you are using Assent on the web.
- A flood stays quiet. When one agent sends more than 25 asks in 10 minutes, the extra asks arrive without a push.
- Asks a rule answers never push.
Quiet hours
Quiet hours run from 22:00 to 07:30 in your time zone unless you change them. Set your time zone and quiet hours in Settings.
During quiet hours, pushes wait and arrive when quiet hours end. Sign-in and code asks are the exception: they push straight away, because the agent is waiting on you.
Due times and reminders
An ask or to-do can have a due time (--due) and a reminder time (--remind). Both take a date and time, 2026-10-15T17:00 or 2026-10-15 17:00 (the agent computer's time zone), or with an offset such as 2026-10-15T17:00:00+01:00. A bare date such as 2026-10-15 means 09:00 that day in your Assent time zone.
Assent reminds you at the reminder time, or at the due time when there is no reminder time. While the ask stays open:
- the first reminder goes at that time, and is skipped if it is more than 12 hours late,
- one more follows 3 hours later,
- after that, while it is overdue, one a day after 09:00,
- and never more than 3 a day for one task.
A reminder push has Done, Snooze until tomorrow and Open.
Exact reminders
A reminder time on a to-do (assent task add --remind, or a time you set yourself) pushes at that exact moment, even in quiet hours. Every other reminder waits for quiet hours to end.
The daily reminder budget
Reminders that are not exact share a daily budget, Reminder pushes a day in Settings on the web: 5 by default, from 0 to 50. At most 2 go out in any 30 minutes, the most important first: approvals from agents, overdue and due today, payments and high priority. Reminders for related to-dos, such as a series of payments or one project track, arrive together as one push.
Before an ask expires
Asks other than to-dos expire if nobody answers them in time (the ask's answerExpiresAt says when). Assent nudges you a day before and again an hour before it expires.
Tidying up
When an ask is answered, resolved or withdrawn, its push is cleared from your phone.